


The End is Connected to the Beginning

by wanderingeyre



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alpha Derek Hale, Alpha Scott McCall (Teen Wolf), Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon-Typical Violence, Druid Stiles Stilinski, Explicit Sexual Content, First Kiss, Hand Jobs, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Magical Accidents, Magical Stiles Stilinski, Minor Cora Hale/Lydia Martin, Minor Scott McCall/Malia Tate, Minor Vernon Boyd/Erica Reyes, Monster of the Week, Mutual Pining, Oblivious Derek Hale, POV Derek Hale, POV Multiple, POV Stiles Stilinski, Pack Feels, Post-Canon, Spark Stiles Stilinski
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-27
Updated: 2020-07-27
Packaged: 2021-03-05 18:53:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,716
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25540129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wanderingeyre/pseuds/wanderingeyre
Summary: Everyone is full and happy, lounging on the couch when Stiles’s tattoos flare green and he feels a tug as something crosses into the Preserve.
Relationships: Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Comments: 20
Kudos: 461
Collections: Another Present Under the Tree





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is part is the imagine-sterek Christmas in July 2020 event - Another Present Under the Tree. 
> 
> Prompts used were:  
> Magical Accidents  
> First Kiss  
> Hurt-Comfort

**Chapter 1**

Stiles spends the afternoon weaving a new protection spell into the wards around the Preserve, stronger than the ones he had renewed around the town the day before. To the wards on the Preserve, he adds a power storage and a dagger spell, so he can both store energy in the ward itself and use it as a weapon against intruders. He sits against a tree and pushes his awareness deep into the earth, flowing deeper than the tap root of the tree whose branches whisper above him in the wind. His new tattoos—vines that intertwine through the double circle, triskele, and wolf that have been on his arm since high school—glow green and there’s a flare of power he’s never felt before. It’s heady and he is giddy at his success when the new spell slams into place. Stiles can feel the ward humming in his awareness as he runs back to the house.

Stiles yanks open the door, almost tripping over the rug—he swears it was not there earlier—and bursts into the kitchen. “Derek, the new wards worked.”

Derek is stirring a pot of chili and looks up to smile at Stiles. Derek’s eyes are warm and Stiles hopes the pounding of his heart will be attributed to the run he just did and not how Derek looks standing in the light of the kitchen in a faded green t-shirt. “Great. I knew you could do it.”

“Was that rug always there by the front door?”

“You mean the one you just tripped over?”

Stiles crosses his arms. “Stupid werewolf hearing.”

Derek chuckles and puts the lid on the pot. “It is new, actually. Most of the pack arrived while you were out. They’re…”

“Out back, yeah, I know.” Stiles is smug with his new knowledge. He’s been training with Deaton and just finished a year-long apprenticeship with a pack in Oregon. The tighter wards mean Stiles knows who or, in most cases, what is on pack lands and he can track the pack if they are close. He doesn’t have werewolf senses, but it’s better than being plain, helpless human Stiles.

Stiles goes out the back door onto a large wrap-around porch filled with chairs and a swing on one end. The old Hale House was torn down four years ago and the pack helped rebuild something new, something theirs, in its place. They worked on it during breaks in college and during summer vacations. Now, they all spend part of their time here, even if they have their own apartments elsewhere. There are plenty of rooms, plenty of space, and the call to be together brings them here more often than not. Stiles is temporarily staying with his dad until he finds a place, but since moving back to Beacon Hills he’s spent half the nights crashed in an extra bedroom here. Getting his own place is starting to seem like more effort than it’s worth.

Dinner is loud and messy. Against all odds, they’ve built a family. When Stiles was visiting other pack druids, he had a hard time explaining his pack with its two alphas, a banshee, a kanima, an assortment of wolves, a hellhound, and humans who had their own skills. They’re odd, but they love each other and they work. Everyone is full and happy, lounging on the couch when Stiles’s tattoos flare green and he feels a tug as something crosses into the Preserve. Something that shouldn’t be here. 

Derek and Scott stand up from their chairs. All heads turn to Stiles, the wolves eyes are flashes of red, blue, and gold. 

“We have a visitor and I don’t think they want to be neighborly,” Stiles says, his blood pounding with adrenaline and a thrill that his wards did their job.

The wolves fan out as they enter the woods with Stiles in the middle, walking between Derek and Scott.

“Do you know what it is?” Derek asks loud enough for Stiles to hear above the pounding of the warning from the land and his wards, a sound of death, power, and something very old has entered their territory. 

Stiles swallows past the power flowing over his tongue and says, “Not friendly, and definitely not here for a social visit. It’s presence feels old.”

Stiles knows his tattoos are a beacon but they are too new, he can’t turn them off, so he plows ahead, letting the trees tell him where to go. When they are a mile from the house, deep in the woods that have gone silent and still as the pack stalks through it, Stiles stops and takes a breath.

They’re in a clearing with a large boulder that towers above their heads in the middle. Stiles knows this clearing because he’s been drawn to it before. It hums with an ebb and flow of power, something beyond time and the land. The power from the clearing is neutral, but there is something else here tainting it, the thing that has breached his wards and trespassed on Pack lands. 

“Stiles, what is it?” Scott asks from his right.

Stiles closes his eyes and his tattoos flare. There is a pinch in his gut and that is all the warning he gets before everything goes fantastically to shit. 

Light erupts in the clearing and bolts of something that looks like blue lightning hits Erica, Boyd, Malia, and Lydia in the chests as they fall to the ground. Stiles’s eyes are blinded by the flash of light so he closes them and uses his other sight to scan the clearing. He can’t fight if he doesn’t know what it is shooting at them.

Derek and Scott’s auras beat a strong red on either side of him. Cora, Theo, and Isaac pulse blue and Liam is a bright gold. Around the corner of the boulder, a thin figure radiates dark green tinged with black, malevolence rolling off it in waves.

“Dammit. It’s a fairy,” Stiles spits out. “Don’t let the lightning touch you. It’s not deadly, but you’ll be out for a while.” Fairies are always trouble.

Stiles drops behind Derek and takes a few more steps to the left to get a better view of their opponent. He can’t see in the dark, but he keeps his awareness open and can still make out the outline of dark green where the fairy leans out to project daggers of light at the wolves.

Stiles decides to try talking. He needs to know why this fairy is here, needs to know if there are others coming, and if he distracts the fairy, the wolves can get close enough to rip it open. “This land is ours to protect. What do you want?”

The voice is a sneer and the alto sound of it grates on Stiles’s ears. “I came to see the one who has claimed this land, a human spark that is both druid and Pack. A human with more power than he should have and a pack that breaks all the rules of tradition. I needed to see the abomination with my own eyes.”

“You’ve seen us, now leave.” Derek takes a step toward the fairy and Scott does the same.

The fairy laughs and the sound is oil in the clearing. “Oh, I don’t think so. There is too much power here for me to let you be, too much fun to be had.” The thing turns toward Stiles, ignoring the wolves. “Did you know that you are a brilliant green battery, full of the power of your Pack and the land? With you I could take back my house, destroy my enemies, and drink their blood.”

“Gross. Bad plan. I pass.” Stiles pulls power to him, ready for what he knows is coming. 

In the corner of his eye, Stiles sees Derek and Scott leap forward toward the fairy, each taking a different side. Stiles pulls on the power pulsing through his body from the wards and the new spells, envisioning the dagger he needs, then pushes it like a spear through the air. The triumph at the spell working properly is snuffed out as Stiles sees the counter spell the fairy casts and knows it is too late to pull his own power back even as it flows from his hand. 

It’s a mirror spell. Stiles has read about it and yells out a warning, but the fairy laughs as Stiles’s own spell reflects off the mirror and slams back to Stiles with double the force, double the intent. Stiles can’t shut the spell off fast enough so his own magic, green and tasting of grass, slices into him and dammit but it hurts.

Stiles’s chest feels like it's being ripped open and the world goes green. The laughter in the clearing stops. The wolves must have gotten to the fairy while it was focused on Stiles. The spell is still working, but now the wards, with its dagger and its storage of power, are ripping into Stiles. It’s a loop, crashing into him over and over and Stiles can barely breathe, let alone find a crack in the onslaught to turn it off. The wards see him as both the source of their power and the enemy. He is having trouble thinking through the haze of green and pain, but he manages to pull back his power, leaving whatever is left in the wards to beat steadily into him.

There is yelling and Stiles feels the stickiness of his own chest. Everything hurts so much he thinks that he should just stop and lay down in the leaves for a bit before he vaguely realizes he is already on the ground.

“Stiles.” Derek and Scott are yelling, at him, at each other.

Someone scoops him up off the ground. Derek, Stiles thinks, when Derek’s voice is close to his head. “Stiles don’t pass out. God, there’s blood everywhere.”

“If he is going to die, bite him,” Scott says.

“No.” Derek’s answer is a pinpoint in Stiles’ pain. “He’s not going to die.”

“Derek.”

“He’s not going to die. Take care of the others. Meet me at the hospital.”

Derek starts running. Stiles is losing time. They are in the woods. He can feel his wards, picking at him, pulling what is left of his power and sinking into his blood like poison. Derek shoves Stiles into the backseat of his SUV. Derek is going to be so pissed if Stiles bleeds to death on his painstakingly vacuumed seats. Stiles tries to laugh but the only sound he manages is wet and airy. The wards are slashing at him, still fighting and Stiles tries to let go of them all, to break the wards, but Derek is already speeding down the road. It’s too late to fix the mess the fairy made and Stiles is all fire and green and agony.

There is a lot of yelling when they get to the hospital. 

\----

Stiles can hear voices in the room but his eyes are too heavy and he gives up trying to listen.

\---

There’s a beeping to his right and someone is holding his hand, squeezing it. Something wet rolls over the back of his hand and Stiles thinks it might be tears. The voice talking to him is breaking and begging and he knows it is Derek, but he can’t move or open his eyes. Stiles is unable to let Derek know he’s still here, that he doesn’t intend to be another person Derek loses. Stiles tumbles back to sleep.

\---

Stiles drifts back to consciousness and this time he opens his eyes though they feel like sandpaper and everything is out of focus. Derek is draped across the uncomfortable looking hospital sofa under the window. There are a bunch of tubes in Stiles’s arm and a machine beeps quietly to his right. Stiles tries to talk but his mouth won’t obey. His heart rate picks up and Derek’s eyes fly open, wide and fearful. He is beside Stiles’s bed in two long strides, picking up his hand. 

Stiles tries to talk again, but he’s so damn tired. 

“Stiles, stay awake.” Derek’s eyes are haunted.

Stiles looks at Derek and tries, but his eyes close.

\---

The next time, Stiles doesn’t bother to open his eyes. He just listens to the conversation happening in his room.

“He’s not getting better,” Scott says.

“But the doctor said there’s nothing wrong with him. The lacerations on his chest have been healed for a week.” Derek’s voice rasps like sand on stone.

 _How long has he been asleep?_ Stiles thinks to himself.

“Whatever is wrong with him, it’s not physical,” Melissa tells them.

It clicks in his head and Stiles uses what energy he has to test his theory. He reaches out to his wards on the Preserve and he can feel the loop, still in place, still pulling from him, then reverberating back to him, daggers cutting in tune with his heart beat. Stiles knows he has to break the loop, but he needs to be at the Preserve, inside the wards he made. 

Stiles takes a deep breath and pulls at his power so he can gather enough to wake up all the way. Derek’s eyes meet his immediately. Stiles concentrates and pushes out the words he needs.

“Get Deaton.”

Everyone in the room moves. Stiles falls back asleep.

\---

There are hushed whispers in his room and Stiles feels thin, the tethers to the pack are fragile like rope that’s been left in the sun too long and the line that leads to the Preserve is frayed in his mind, but still pulsing, still eating at him, slice by slice. Stiles opens his eyes. It’s so much harder than it should be. 

Derek is standing by his bedside and he is squeezing Stiles’s hand, but Stiles doesn’t have the energy to squeeze back. Derek’s hair is unkempt and longer than he remembers. _How long has he been asleep? Didn’t he already ask that question?_ There are deep bruises under Derek’s eyes from lack of sleep and he looks as exhausted as Stiles feels. 

“Deaton’s here,” Derek says.

Stiles swivels his eyes to the rest of the room. His dad is there, looking as bad as Derek, but he can’t spend time on how their appearances affect him. He knows he has to tell Deaton what happened so they can fix this and Stiles can feel the throb of his power, still looping back into him, both source and dagger. He won’t be able to wake up next time. This is his one shot. 

Stiles gathers everything he has and opens his mouth. His voice is a whisper and Deaton leans down to listen. “The wards. I built in a power source to the wards. Me.” Stiles takes a breath and pushes forward. “Added a dagger to the ward to use as a weapon.” Stiles is panting with the effort and the pressure on his hand from where Derek is holding it increases. “Fairy used a mirror spell. Still looping.” Stiles relaxes. He said what he needed to say.

Deaton is silent.

Derek looks at Stiles before he huffs out a frustrated breath. “What does that mean? What’s wrong with him? Why is he getting worse?”

Deaton lays a hand on Stiles’s shoulder and squeezes and Stiles is surprised by the gesture. Stiles must really be in trouble, must really be dying and not only feeling like he might. “That was very clever of you to do, but dangerous. You should’ve asked me before weaving both those spells into your wards. You should have created a fail-safe.” Deaton’s steady brown eyes move from Stiles to Derek. “We have to get him back to the Preserve. Now. He has to break the wards and he has to do that before he doesn’t have the strength to. Stiles created a very strong ward for the pack, but he built into it two additional spells. One acts as a battery, pulling power from Stiles to stay active, and one acts as a magical weapon. The fairy used a mirror spell and what should have felled the fairy is still attacking Stiles.”

“But they’re his wards.” There is a whine at the end of the words and Stiles wonders again how long he has been asleep, wasting away on this bed, to make Derek sound so broken.

“That is exactly the problem. Stiles was too wounded to stop the spell or he didn’t know what the consequences would be and now the wards are both using him as a source of power and attacking him as an enemy. The ward can only be broken in the protected area.” 

His dad moves to the door. “I’ll go tell Melissa to get his paperwork in order so you two can take him. Don’t wait. Just go. I’ll handle the doctor.” 

Deaton nods. “I’ll follow you in my car. It would be best if we took him back to the clearing where the fight happened.”

Derek’s face locks down into what Stiles knows is determination and force of will, going blank as he gently pulls the IV out of Stiles’s arm and removes the sensors from Stiles’s skin. The machine beeps and he turns it off. Derek dresses him and Stiles can’t help. He’s tired and aching. He should be embarrassed, but Stiles is too far gone to care. His eyes don’t stay open but he listens. 

Derek hooks an arm under Stiles’s legs, wraps Stiles’s arm around his shoulders, and starts to pick Stiles up. Before he does, Derek dips his face into Stiles’s neck and breathes deep, his entire body shaking. 

“Please don’t die.”

Stiles tries to open his mouth, but it stays closed. Bouncing in his head are the words he wants to say. _Sourwolf, I’m trying not too. Don’t be sad. I love you._ The last one Stiles repeats over and over in his head as if they are a spell that could make everything better. _I love you. I love you. I love you._ His mouth stays closed, but his eyes are open.

Derek shudders. “I love you.” The words ghost over Stiles’s skin and seep into his pores, down into his battered soul.

Stiles closes his eyes and his eyes seep tears. He’s waited for this for so long and now he is dying and can’t do anything about it. Stiles takes a deep breath and tries one more time. He manages to say one thing before he falls back asleep.

“Sourwolf.”

\---

There’s a rustling overhead, leaves in the wind, trees in the sun, and Stiles knows before he even opens his eyes they have brought him to the Preserve. He slept while they traveled through the wards so he knows things are worse than he thought. He’s not sure he has the strength to break the ward and fear is a cold blanket on his skin. He always imagined he’d go out in a blaze of ill-timed glory, not weak and gasping on the forest floor. 

Stiles turns his head and sees the boulder in the clearing. The ground is soft beneath him, full of years of moss and leaves. Stiles dips what awareness he has left down into the ground. He can feel the tattoos on his arm burn as his body tries to find an equilibrium of power. The slice of pain across his abdomen surprises him.

Derek is on his knees beside him in a moment, hands frantically pulling up Stiles’s shirt to press his hands over the wound there. “Dammit, Deaton. What the fuck is happening?”

“The wards are still attacking him.”

There is silence and Stiles fights to stay awake. He pulls on the energy of the forest and feels another line of fire cross his chest. 

Deaton is kneeling on his other side now. “Derek, put both of your hands on him. Imagine the essence of your wolf and imagine it flowing into Stiles the same way you draw out pain. Send power in instead of taking pain out. The tether of Alpha and Pack and Druid may be enough to give Stiles strength that does not come from his own powers. His wards are still attacking him, even here, even now, but he must find some power to break the loop, even if it is not his own.”

Deaton puts a hand on Stiles’s arm. “Stiles. Listen very carefully. You need to pull the power from Derek like you do through the forest. Not enough to hurt him but enough to break the wards. You can’t pull power from the land like you normally would because the land is still attacking you. Pull the power from Derek and find the wards in your mind and in the Preserve. Push your power into them and concentrate on dismantling the spells. It's like untying a knot.”

“Now,” Deaton says the command with force and Stiles tries to obey.

Derek is a pulse of red power on his left. The edges of Derek’s red aura are entwined with light green leaves and Stiles knows he should pay more attention to that, but he can’t. Not now. 

Stiles can feel the burn of the wolf on his skin and he draws on that power even though it goes against everything he has been taught as a druid—never take the life force of another, never take so much power from the land that you wound it, only use your power for defense. Derek is offering his power up willingly and Stiles wants to weep for it, but there is no time, no tears. He can feel the tattered edges of his own life-force, the rips and tears too close to the vital center. 

Stiles gathers Derek’s red power and adds what little green he has left and searches for the wards. They echo in his head when he bumps up against them. They are strong still and he spares a moment to congratulate himself. Stiles wraps his power around the wards and pulls. Another line of fire traces over his leg and he bites back the pain and yanks with everything he has left. _Gods, let it be enough._ His tattoos blaze green then flash red, the color of an alpha’s eyes, before they settle into green leaves tipped with red. 

The world is a swirl of red and green and a haze of pain, but the loop is closed, the wards are broken, and Stiles opens his eyes. His breathing is shallow gasps of relief through the agony that is his body.

“Stiles?” the question is dragged from Derek’s lips, his eyes bleeding red.

“Still here, big guy. Not dead yet.” Stiles’s voice is barely louder than the rustle of the leaves.

Derek blinks and his eyes are back to a swirl of hazel. “Thank God.”

Deaton leans back on his heels. “Stiles, you need to lay where you are for a time. Allow the land to come back into you and fill up the power you’ve lost. I have a first aid kit in my bag. We can clean up the cuts. They should heal faster than the last ones.”

Deaton walks away, leaving Derek and Stiles alone. Stiles wants to say something about what Derek said at the hospital, about what Stiles was unable to say, but he doesn’t know how to start. He wonders if, now that the desperation is over, if Derek will even admit to the confession at all.

Derek says nothing and Deaton returns. An awareness pulls on Stiles. “The rest of the pack is coming.” His voice is stronger this time. He can feel them, coming fast, panicked and hopeful. 

The clearing is soon filled with everyone, including his dad and Melissa. Melissa kneels by Stiles and starts using the supplies from Deaton’s bag to clean him up. 

“You’ll be fine. These won’t even require stitches,” she says as she applies skin glue to the one on his chest that burns the most.

“You have some awesome scars now.” Scott is smiling from his perch at Stiles’s feet. Derek is hovering on Stiles’s left and he frowns as if the scars themselves could be vanquished by his expression. 

Stiles is already feeling more alert, the power of the forest pulses into him with its own slow heartbeat of life. He is able to smile at Scott and say, “I hear ladies dig scars. I wonder if it works on guys as well.” Scott makes a snorting noise.

Melissa tapes some bandages over the lacerations and Stiles takes a deep breath, testing out the way his skin stretches and moves. His chest is tight but he can breathe and he no longer struggles to stay awake. Every muscle is still a pinch of pain, but it’s not acute. 

The pack drift forward one at a time, each touching him, running fingers over his face, arms, neck, and legs. When they have each assured themselves that Stiles is no longer in danger of dying, they sit close, still touching, so Stiles becomes the center of a circle of people on the forest floor. Stiles closes his eyes, not to sleep, but to reconnect in his own way, reforging connections that the recent days—weeks?—have damaged.

 _I’m going to have to ask soon how long I was in the hospital, but now is not the time,_ he thinks.

Stiles starts with those closest to him and works his way out. Lydia is brushing her fingers over his forehead and holding hands with Cora. Their connection is new and bright and it shines in his mind like the spring sun. Theo, Liam, and Issac are lined up along his right side, sitting cross legged with their knees touching his side. Boyd and Erica are on his other side, their hands entwined and laying on his hip. They were gone for a long time, but came back home three years ago tired from wherever they had been. Their relief at being welcomed home had been a physical thing. Scott and Malia are at his feet, their knees drawn up and their feet tangled with his. Stiles realizes he doesn’t have shoes on and neither do they. He was wearing his baby blue chucks the night of the fight with the fairy. He bought them because they matched Roscoe and he hopes the blood comes out of them if someone thought to save them.

There are four people who are not directly touching him, but who are close enough that Stiles has no trouble weaving them into the circles he has been making through the pack. Deaton’s aura flares when Stiles touches him with his consciousness. Deaton is the official Emissary since Stiles found it hard to be neutral, as is required, and Stiles’s spark led him towards being a druid for the Hale-McCall Pack instead. Melissa and his dad are sitting behind Scott and Malia. Melissa has her head on his dad’s shoulder and Stiles wonders where Chris and Parrish are. Probably working. Those two are always working.

Derek’s hand is heavy on his right shoulder, Derek’s fingers press into his skin with a gentle pressure. Derek’s aura is strong and red, like his alpha eyes, and the vines, darker green than they were before, curl at the edges. The sight of them is bittersweet. It is not the way Stiles would have chosen to find out that their auras reflect each other. He’s not sure he knows what it means, but he has time now to figure it out. Now that he thinks he’s going to live. Stiles can taste the hope tinged with desperation in Derek’s aura on the back of his tongue and Stiles drinks it down. He weaves the pack together, pulling power from the land, and weaving the circle tighter. Stiles lifts a hand and covers Derek’s with it and squeezes.

“Stiles that’s enough for one night.” Deaton’s voice is loud in the clearing where only their heartbeats and breathing were present. “Do not try and touch the wards until you are recovered and I am here. I want to make sure we have completely undone what you wove into them before you try again.” Deaton stands. “Stiles will need more rest, but he needs to stay on the land he has claimed, inside the wards.”

The hand on his shoulder tightens. “He can stay in the pack house. I’ll take care of him.”

His dad and Derek have a silent exchange before his dad sighs. “I’ll bring a bag of clothes back for him.”

“We’ll help too.” Theo puts an arm around Issac and Liam. The three of them are the only ones without their own apartment in town.

Everyone starts to move, slowly as if they are still afraid to jostle Stiles, or worse, as if they are afraid he will fade and disappear if they stop touching him. Derek and Scott are the last ones to move. 

“Do you think you can sit up?” Derek asks.

Stiles tries but fails halfway and Derek’s arm is there around his shoulders, easing him into a sitting position. The world tilts and Stiles breathes in deep until the black spots in his vision cease to float like specters. Derek’s arm is a comfort and a wall along Stiles’s shoulder blades. This position puts their faces close together and their breath mingles in the forest air. Stiles wants so badly to know if Derek means those things he said in the hospital or if it was all fatigue and exhaustion.

Derek ends up carrying Stiles back to the house. It’s over a mile of walking, and it should be awkward, but it’s not. 

Stiles expects Derek to take him to the spare bedroom he usually sleeps in on pack nights, the room with the bunk and trundle beds, but he skips that room and continues to the room at the end of the hall. Stiles has been in Derek’s room before, plenty of times, but he’s never been carried into it before. Derek lays him down in the center of the king sized bed with the mahogany carved headboard that is pushed up against one wall. The headboard belonged to Derek’s parents and has a woodland scene with running wolves on it. There are years of protective wards and power sunk deep into the wood. 

Derek moves the comforter and sheet down from under Stiles and pulls them back over him, tucking him in. Of all the things that have happened up to this point, it’s the way that Derek tucks the comforter over him that breaks Stiles open. His eyes fill and he does nothing to stop the tears that roll down his face. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Derek has imagined Stiles in his bed plenty of times over the years, but never like this, faded, broken, and weeping. Derek’s chest still feels cracked open, exposed. It has been since Stiles fell in the woods five weeks ago.

**Chapter 2**

Derek has imagined Stiles in his bed plenty of times over the years, but never like this, faded, broken, and weeping. Derek’s chest still feels cracked open, exposed. It has been since Stiles fell in the woods five weeks ago. Derek could feel Stiles slipping these past weeks, while he sat in that God awful hospital room, unable to breathe through the cloying fear and pain and the pungent smell of antiseptic. Now Stiles is here, better, improving, but weeping. Derek didn’t know his heart could hurt more, but it does, even as he tries to reassure himself that Stiles is going to get better. 

Derek sits on the edge of the bed and wipes at the tears on Stiles’s face. “You’ll get better. It won’t always be like this,” Derek tells him.

Stiles is silent for a long time and it’s the silence that cuts Derek. A quiet Stiles is either thinking deeply or hurt. Finally Stiles’s mouth twitches up. “This isn’t how I thought I’d end up in your bed.”

Derek is used to Stiles making these jokes, knows he doesn’t mean anything by them. Not really. Humor is how Stiles deflects. The banter is familiar and soothing. Derek stands. “You should rest.” There is a flicker of something that looks like disappointment on Stiles’s face. Derek ignores it and says, “I’m going to make some of the chicken soup you like.”

“With the wide noodles?” Stiles’s face is hopeful.

Derek smiles at him fondly. “Of course.”

Derek is almost to the door when Stiles asks a question that punches him in the gut. “How long was I in the hospital?”

Derek’s grip on the doorknob is white-knuckled. Those days and nights in the hospital stole pieces of his soul. They were ripped out and ground under the heels of the belief that he was going to sit in that room and watch Stiles die before he’d ever told Stiles all the things he’s hidden away. He had refused to leave, immobilized with the certainty that if he left, Stiles would die while he was absent. Derek has watched other people he loved die, but there is no way he would recover from a Stiles sized hole in his life. Even now, the danger is passed, according to Deaton, and Derek is afraid to breathe.

Derek steadies himself and turns back to Stiles. He can hear the other pack members moving around in their rooms and downstairs. Most of them refused to go home, even though they have apartments and houses of their own, still needing the comfort of being together after watching everything fall apart for weeks.

“Five weeks.” The words hurt to say out loud and Derek watches as Stiles’s brown eyes widen.

“Five weeks?” Stiles croaks. “Oh my God, no wonder your hair is so long.”

That pulls a surprised huff of a laugh out of Derek. “My hair is too long?”

Stiles shrugs. “Just longer than normal.” Stiles’s stomach rumbles and Derek knows what needs to be done.

“Get some rest. I’ll be back.”

Stiles’s voice stops him one more time. “I’m afraid to go to sleep. I couldn’t wake up when I wanted to before.” 

Derek moves back to the bed and picks up Stiles’s hand. 

Stiles continues, “In the hospital, I tried to stay awake, but I couldn’t. The last time, right before you moved me, I thought I’d never wake up again. I feel a little stronger, but…”

“But the fear is still there,” Derek finishes.

Stiles nods and blinks, his long lashes a dark outline against his paler than normal cheeks and Derek’s already bruised heart beats painfully.

“Do you want me to stay until you go to sleep?”

“Yes. Please.”

Derek stays and Stiles sleeps.

\---

Derek makes soup, chopping the carrots and celery with care. He keeps one ear focused on the steady heartbeat in his bedroom as Stiles sleeps and Derek tries to trust the peace that it gives him knowing that Stiles is going to be okay, that Stiles is safe and whole and in his bed. Derek’s hand shakes and he takes a steadying breath. There are too many avenues to go down when he thinks about Stiles in his bed, so he does what he always does, he pushes the thoughts aside and focuses on something mundane. 

Derek makes soup.

The soup simmers and, when Derek hears Stiles beginning to wake up, he drops the egg noodles in so they are perfect by the time Stiles is fully awake. Derek carries the soup into his room and has to steady himself for the sight of Stiles there, struggling to sit up. Derek moves quick, putting the bowl on the bedside table and putting an arm around Stiles to help him the last bit. Derek breathes deep, letting the smell of Stiles settle over his bones.

Derek sits on the bed and tries to feed some of the soup to Stiles.

Stiles smiles at Derek, but accepts the bite of food. Derek tries to suppress the thrill of taking care of Stiles this way, of how much his wolf loves this new arrangement.

“I think I can do this myself.”

Derek is disappointed and then annoyed with himself for that. “Are you sure?”

Stiles wraps his long fingers around Derek’s hand that is gripping the spoon. “You look like hell.” Stiles licks his lips and meets Derek’s gaze. “You look like you haven’t slept, eaten, or showered properly for five weeks. I promise to eat this, if you’ll go shower, then bring some food for yourself up here and keep me company.”

Derek can feel the imprint of each of Stiles’s fingers and he wonders what those fingers would feel like elsewhere. He swallows. “I’m glad you’re here,” is what comes out of his mouth first. “Are you sure?” is what Derek asks next.

Stiles unwraps his hand from Derek’s and takes the bowl from him. “I’m sure. Go.”

Derek waits to make sure Stiles can actually feed himself before he grabs a change of clothes and goes into the bathroom attached to the bedroom to take a shower. When he comes out, feeling better than he has in weeks, in clean clothes, Stiles is asleep again and the bowl on the bedside table is empty. Derek goes down to get his own bowl of soup and eats it upstairs in his room, sitting in the overstuffed armchair that Lydia insisted matched the tones of the room perfectly, his eyes on Stiles while the other man slept.

When he is done, Derek does the one thing he’s wanted to do since he laid Stiles down in his bed and tucked him in. Derek lifts the covers and crawls into the bed beside Stiles, pulling the other man close and curling around him. Stiles turns his back to Derek and snuggles back into him, a smile ghosting over Stiles’s face. Derek’s own heart skips then settles as he lays his head on the pillow. 

Derek thinks Stiles is still asleep until Stiles says, “The soup was perfect. Thanks for not making me sleep alone.” Stiles presses into Derek again and Derek sucks in a breath. Stiles sighs. “You’re warm. This is nice.”

“Go to sleep, Stiles.” Derek squeezes Stiles’s hip and Stiles grabs his hand and pulls it around until Derek’s arm is wrapped around Stiles. A wave of contentment and peace wash over Derek. Stiles is safe. Stiles is here. Derek doesn’t even try to stay awake.

\---

Derek wakes up slowly the next morning, surrounded by the scent of cinnamon, leaves, and Stiles warm, asleep, and whole, in his bed. Stiles’s heartbeat is sure and strong, something Derek thanks whoever is listening, and slides from the bed, glad to be able to escape to get his own heart and emotions in check. Stiles has been through too much. He does not need Derek’s messy feelings on top of almost dying.

Stiles sleeps through most of the day. The pack is quiet, but they all cycle through the house, content to sit in the same house and listen to Stiles resting in Derek’s room. It’s almost dinner when there’s a knock on the door. Even though he has been a member of the pack for a couple years now, Noah still knocks at the door instead of barging in like everyone else. Derek likes that about him.

Derek is pulling a pan of homemade mac and cheese with bacon—one of Stiles’s favorites—from the oven. “Theo, let Noah in.”

Noah comes into the kitchen, still in his uniform, but looking more rested than he has in weeks. Derek understands. He saw the same changes in himself this morning. 

“Derek, how are things today?”

Derek knows there are many layers to that question. “Things have been quiet. Stiles ate some soup yesterday but has been sleeping since then.” Derek pauses. There’s a change in Stiles’s heartbeat. “He’s waking up now if you want to go see him. Tell him I made mac and cheese with bacon that I will bring up to him in a bit.” Derek turns his back like a coward when he adds, “He’s in my room.”

Noah doesn’t say anything to that and Derek is relieved. He wouldn’t even know where to start. Derek makes a salad and pulls out plates and utensils, then loads up a plate for Stiles and grabs a glass of ice water before he goes upstairs. Stiles brightens up when Derek comes through the door, but Derek tells himself it is because of what he is carrying.

“You made my favorite.” Stiles makes grabby hands at the plate. “All I had to do was almost die.”

Derek makes a pained expression and Stiles adds, “Too soon?”

“Yes,” both Noah and Derek say at the same time.

“Noah, there’s plenty and the pack would love for you to stay.”

“Thanks, I’ll be down in a bit.”

Stiles looks up from his plate. “Make sure he eats salad, a big one.” Noah rolls his eyes but smiles.

Derek nods and walks to the door. “I’ll send someone else up when you leave.”

Derek tunes out the conversation Stiles has with his father while he goes downstairs to round everyone else up. Noah comes down about an hour later. Looking even better than he did before, Stiles has that effect on people. Without being asked, Liam gets up and goes upstairs to be with Stiles.

After dinner, Theo and Isaac do the dishes and Derek walks with Noah outside.

Noah puts his hand on the door handle of his car but turns back around to face Derek. The older man leans against the police cruiser. “Let me know if Stiles needs anything else from the house. I know he keeps some things here, but most of his stuff is still with me, for as long as that lasts.” 

Derek crosses his arms over his chest. “Stiles complains about living at home again, but I think he secretly loves being able to mother hen you.”

“You’re right about that, but that’s not really what I was talking about,” Noah says. His face is serious. “I meant I figured he would eventually move in here with the rest of the pack.” He hesitates, presses his lips into a thin line. “With you. Don’t think I didn’t notice that he’s currently sleeping in your bed, son.”

Derek opens his mouth to say something, anything, as a blush creeps up the back of his neck. Noah holds up a hand to keep him quiet and Derek presses his crossed arms tighter and keeps his lips closed. 

“I know nothing is happening now, but he won’t be sick forever and I know what he means to you. Don’t forget, I was in that hospital room too. I’ve seen you both often enough to know how you feel about each other.”

Derek feels lightheaded. There is no way Noah is right. Stiles doesn’t harbor any of those kinds of feelings for him.

“Just don’t forget to be kind to each other and be adults.” Noah levels a look at him. “Use your words, son. Both of you have a terrible problem using words when they matter most. Stiles talks too much and you talk too little. Find some middle ground.”

Derek opens his mouth, but snaps it closed. _What the hell is he supposed to say to that?_

“Goodnight, Derek.” Noah gets in his car and leaves. Derek stands on the gravel drive for a long time after he leaves.

That night, when he slides into bed with Stiles, he keeps playing Noah’s words over and over, wondering at the truth of them, feeling them around in his head to see if he dared believe them. Stiles is as snuggly as ever, but that is not different. Derek goes to sleep with his nose buried in Stiles’s neck and decides the larger questions will have to wait until later.

\---

After a week, Stiles makes his way downstairs. He has showered and looks so much like himself that Derek grips the edge of the table hard to keep from getting up and wrapping Stiles in a big wolf hug. Scott, who is making a sandwich, doesn’t hesitate. He walks around the island in the kitchen and engulfs Stiles in a hug that lifts Stiles’s feet off the ground. 

After that day, some of the tension eases in Derek. Stiles is getting better. 

Stiles and Scott plan a pack movie night and everyone comes, even Chris, Melissa, and Noah who usually avoid movie nights because it often devolves into something less like movie watching and more like a popcorn wrestling war. Parrish shows up after his shift with cookies and he’s hailed as the hero of the night. It’s the first pack night since Stiles came home from the hospital and there is a palatable relief and joy in the house. Instead of fighting over what movie to watch, they let Stiles pick the first _X-Men_ movie and then everyone but the older adults proceed to fight over who gets to sit with Stiles on the couch. Derek laughs at them and Stiles catches his eye and winks. The warm feeling stays with Derek all night. 

When it’s time to go to bed, Derek hesitates. Stiles is almost recovered. Will Stiles want to move back into the pack bunkroom or claim one of the empty upstairs rooms? There is no good reason for Stiles to keep sleeping in Derek’s room, in his bed. Derek’s chest tightens as he opens the door to the room they’ve been sharing. Their scents have melded and Derek is both pleased and painfully aware it won’t last. It shouldn’t last. Derek has nothing to offer Stiles.

Stiles pokes his head out of the bathroom door, toothbrush in his mouth. “Hey. Do you mind if I read in bed? I can go downstairs if you want.”

There is a skip in Stiles’s heartbeat that Derek can’t decipher. “No, please stay. It won’t bother me.”

Stiles beams at him and Derek falls asleep with his back against Stiles thinking that there are few things he would trade for the feeling of Stiles’s lanky body sprawled around Derek as Stiles reads.

\---

Deaton comes the next day and Stiles walks into the woods with him to fix the wards. Derek does not let on that he is worried and haunted by the memory of Stiles covered in blood on the forest floor, but anxiety pinches at Derek until he goes outside and sits on the grass in the yard, full of too much energy to sit on the porch. The touch of the grass and the dirt on his bare feet help ground him. After two hours, he can hear Deaton and Stiles returning and he listens though he knows he shouldn’t. The worry for Stiles is still there, a ghost of the yawning despair from the hospital, and Derek needs to know Stiles is okay after working on the wards.

“Do you know what it means? The change in your aura?” Deaton asks.

“Yes. I looked it up once I was well enough,” Stiles’s voice is strong but there is something else there, something that spikes the lingering worry in Derek and he can feel a mirror of it in Stiles through their pack bond.

“You should tell him. He needs to know.”

“No, it won’t make a difference and I don’t want him to think I did something to make it happen on purpose.”

Stiles’s voice is heavy with a burden, a sadness that makes Derek stand up. His feet are moving before he realizes he has taken three steps. He forces himself to stop.

“But you said you noticed it before we healed you. The change was already there.”

“Yes, but I don’t know what that means. For him.”

“Don’t you?”

They don’t speak any more and Derek can smell the tinge of sadness on Stiles when they break through the trees. Derek wants to ask what the conversation was about, but Stiles smiles and throws an arm around Derek’s shoulder when Stiles sees him.

“Wards are almost back to normal. No more extras for now though. Deaton’s orders.” Stiles hip checks Derek. “Want to play Mario Kart tonight? We can do a tournament with whoever is around. I need something to do and I’m not cleared for work yet. Dad says it’ll be another week.” 

Stiles is going to join the Beacon Hills PD as the FBI Supernatural Liaison. He should have started four weeks ago, but everything was derailed after the fairy attack. 

“Sure, that sounds great.” As if Derek would refuse Stiles anything.

The smell of sadness fades from Stiles and Derek decides whatever it was, Stiles will tell him when it’s time.

Over the next week, Stiles is quieter than he was before his time in the hospital and when no one is around, a small fog of unease and sadness follow him. Stiles snaps out of it as soon as Derek comes into the room and he never moves out of Derek’s bed, so Derek leaves well enough alone. He falls asleep tangled with Stiles and wonders how long it will be before everything comes crashing down.

The answer, it seems, is four more days.

One morning, Derek wakes up and Stiles is already up. He can smell pancakes and bacon cooking downstairs. Derek takes his time showering. While sleeping alongside Stiles has been great, waking up with a hard on has been both pleasant and embarrassing. The fact that it has become more frequent—it’s just biology, Stiles insists—is carefully ignored by them both. In the shower, Derek takes himself in hand, the pressure and movements a relief and not quite what he needs, but it will have to do. If he comes faster and harder than normal, no one is around to know and Derek is careful to keep his lips pressed together. There are nosy werewolves in the house and he would never let his words reveal to others the things that he wants but has no right to. 

By the time Derek makes it downstairs, Stiles, Isaac, and Theo have eaten over half the pancakes and are arguing about what super power they would want if they could pick one.

Stiles pushes a plate towards Derek. “I saved you some from these two monsters.”

Derek sits next to Stiles and listens. The hint of sadness is there in Stiles’s scent again, heavier and more pronounced, and Derek knows the other two wolves notice it, but none of them say anything. Theo and Isaac trade looks with Derek over pancakes as if Derek can do anything about the feelings Stiles is putting out. Derek eats his pancakes in silence.

Stiles starts fidgeting, a wave of sadness crashes into Derek from Stiles, who stands and gathers his plate. Stiles puts his plate in the dishwasher and turns to face them as he pauses in the doorway. 

The smile on Stiles’s face is only half there and it guts Derek. Stiles’s lips are fine but there are lines around his eyes that are too wide and full of too many things for a smile. “I’m going to pack up. Scott is going to take me… home,” Stiles voice trips over the word, “in a couple hours.” Stiles flees upstairs and Derek is left with his emotions in a puddle at his feet.

Theo and Isaac whine and look at Derek but Derek can’t breathe and the world tilts. Derek can hear Stiles upstairs. Can hear the angry beat of his heart. Can taste the desperation in Stiles as if it is Derek’s own and he is not sure it isn’t. Isaac and Theo are talking to him but Derek doesn’t understand the words. He has to get out of this house. Away from the smell of pancakes and Pack and StilesandDerek together like they belong that way. Away from the sound of Stiles shoving his things in the rolling duffel upstairs in the room they’ve been sharing.

Derek is unsteady when he stands, but he grips the edge of the table, the wood creaking under his grip, until he can remain upright on his own. He walks out the front door, closing it with a small click, and stumbles down the front stairs of the porch. The grass is wet on his bare feet and Derek walks through the front yard and into the forest, far enough that the trees will hide him from anyone at the house. He kneels in the dirt and leaves, can feel them pressing into his knees as he digs his fingers in the ground, his nails now claws. Derek is silent, though everything in him screams. Derek doesn’t want to alert anyone at the house, doesn’t want to alert Stiles.

Derek knows he has to let Stiles go, knows that Derek ruins every relationship he has, knows that how he feels for Stiles can stay a burden he carries alone, knows Stiles deserves to be happy, and Derek is not someone who brings happiness to anyone. Derek has managed to build a pack with Scott and he is content with that. He is. He has to be. It’s all more than he deserves.

Derek should have known Stiles would find him. He can hear Stiles when he leaves the house, the footsteps getting louder as he walks through the yard, and stops beside him. Derek is frozen on his knees, frightened of what will come out of his mouth if he talks first. There is a hand and pressure on his shoulder as Stiles squeezes and it stays there for a long time. Derek covers Stiles’s hand with his own, his nails now fully human, and holds on.

Stiles doesn’t break contact as he walks around Derek and sits in front of him, cross legged on the ground with their hands still together. Stiles moves his hand and twines their fingers.

Stiles looks at Derek, head on, his eyelashes sweeping up and down, and Derek’s heart is breaking, the sound echoed by the beats coming from Stiles’s chest. “I need to tell you something.”

Derek nods. He is prepared for goodbye. It’s what he expects.

“You know everyone has an aura. Werewolves tend to have auras that reflect both their status in the pack and their ties within it. Other supernaturals are similar. Humans are more of a mixed bag. They can really be any color, just something that reflects their core. Auras can change as connections to others and life experiences happen.”

Derek does not know where this is going, but he knows that Stiles always has a purpose. Stiles hesitates and anxiety rolls off him. Whatever he has to say next, he doesn’t want to.

“I don’t always look at your aura too closely, anyone’s really, if I can help it. It’s invasive, like reading their mind to find secrets, but I saw yours when you brought me back to the Preserve after we left the hospital. Before you pushed your power into mine and helped me heal.”

There are so many terrible things that could show up in his aura, Derek doesn’t want to know what Stiles saw and he is ashamed that Stiles has seen the worst of him.

Stiles squeezes Derek’s hand. “Your aura is a strong alpha red, that I expected, but you had pale green vines on the edges of your aura. Vines that look like the ones tattooed on my arm. The vines darkened after you helped heal me. They’re a bright green now.” Stiles takes a deep breath and meets Derek’s eyes. “ _My_ aura is a bright green with vines. After you helped heal me, the leaves on the vines in my aura were tipped in red.”

Derek holds his breath. “What does it mean?”

The anxiety in the air spikes from Stiles and some of the hope in Derek shrinks back. “Derek, you have to know that our power fed on something that was already there. I didn’t do anything to make our auras reflect each other. I didn’t use the healing to bind you to me. I would never do that.”

Because being bound to Derek would be the worst fate. Derek knows.

Stiles flicks his forehead. “Stop thinking that. I’m not upset that our bonds strengthened or that I’m bound tighter to you, idiot wolf. I’m upset that you think I would force something on you just because it’s what I’ve wanted since, well since forever.”

Derek’s mind is scrambling and he says the first dumb thing he can think of. “Stiles, you didn’t even like me when we met.”

“I was scared shitless of you, but you were the hottest thing I’d ever seen. My teenage self was not prepared for you.” Stiles grabs Derek’s other hand. “The healing spell acted on feelings that already existed and strengthened it. Pack bonds are always tight between the pack and pack druid, but ours is more pronounced. We don’t have to do anything about it, do anything different, if we don’t want to.”

Derek can’t swallow past the words stuck in his throat and his hands tighten where he is touching Stiles.

Stiles shakes his head. “I always knew you’d be too emotionally constipated for this conversation.” He sighs. “Let me try again. I’ll make it easy on you. I don’t want to leave.”

The words sink in. “I don’t want you to leave,” Derek replies, the words a whisper.

“I want to stay but I don’t want to sleep in the pack bunk room. I want to stay with you.”

“With me?”

“Are you going to repeat everything I say?” Stiles closes his eyes for a minute and the tattoos on his arms flare green, then red, then they are both red and green together. The smell of grass and cinnamon fill the space around them. Derek can feel his wolf respond to the power in Stiles. It feels like home and safety and pack and love. Stiles opens his eyes. “I heard what you said at the hospital, when you were bringing me here. I heard and I tried to talk but for once in my life my mouth would not move when I needed it to.”

Derek knows that now is the time when he has to speak or he will lose everything. “I love you. I have for a very long time.”

“Since when?”

“You have a way of blowing in like a storm and taking over. I loved you before I even knew it happened.” Derek smiles then, tentative and new.

“What I tried to tell you at the hospital was that I love you too, Sourwolf.”

They both sit there and grin at each other stupidly. 

“What now?” Derek asks.

“Honestly?”

Derek nods.

Pure mischief shines from Stiles’s face. “I think we should make out in the woods.”

Derek laughs as Stiles pulls him to his feet and yanks him deeper into the woods. Stiles’s tattoos are glowing when he pushes Derek against a tree and their mouths crash together. It’s messy and full of years of too much want and need. Derek’s hand is on the back of Stiles’s neck and the other is squeezing into Stiles’s hip bone. Stiles’s hands are everywhere, tracing down Derek’s face, sneaking under his shirt, and slipping under the waistband of Derek’s shorts. It’s too much and Derek is hard and aching and he can feel Stiles everywhere. This won’t last unless they slow down.

Derek breaks from Stiles and rests their foreheads together, panting. “Give me a second or this is going to be over embarrassingly fast.”

Stiles snickers and yanks his shirt off before he grabs for Derek’s. Stiles pulls Derek’s shorts down to his thighs, palms Derek’s erection as it pops free, and gives Derek a lazy jerk while he kisses Derek slow and steady. If the frenetic pace of before stole his breath, this languid kissing and the feel of Stiles holding him almost sends Derek over the edge. 

Derek returns the favor and slides Stiles’s shorts down, wrapping his own hand around Stiles. Stiles leans back and looks at him, eyes wide and pupils blown. 

“God, you’re beautiful,” Derek says.

“I want to try something. Do you trust me?” Stiles asks, giving Derek’s cock a squeeze.

Derek’s response is to drop to his knees and take Stiles quickly and without preamble into his mouth. Stiles groans and pulls at Derek’s hair. Derek swallows Stiles down and grabs Stiles’s hips for leverage. Stiles makes the most delicious noises and Derek stays down there longer than he intended before he pops his mouth off Stiles with a wet sound and stands up.

“Damn, I hope all my questions get answered that way in the future.” Stiles grins and lifts his own hand to his mouth, licking it everywhere. Derek’s knees are weak watching it and Derek snakes a hand around Stiles, pulling their hips together, reveling in the feel of them hard and pressing into each other. 

Stiles reaches down with his wet hand and gathers their cocks into his palm, rubbing the precome into their skin, and wrapping his long fingers around them both. With his free hand, Stiles pulls Derek’s hand down and wraps it around the fist holding them together. 

Stiles pumps into his hand, sliding against Derek. The friction shoots directly to the back of Derek’s spine and he drops his head back against the tree. Stiles leans forward and bites his exposed neck while he pumps into their hands. They find a rhythm, slow and steady and filled with open mouthed kisses. Derek never could have imagined anything like this, then he feels a pull in his aura.

Derek opens his eyes and he knows they are alpha red. Stiles’s tattoos are burning a swirl of bright green and red. “What…” he starts to ask, but Stiles kisses the question away.

“Close your eyes.” Stiles tells Derek as their hips meet as if to accentuate his point. “Open up your other senses.”

It’s hard to concentrate when Stiles is everywhere, sliding against him, but he does and Derek feels it then. Everytime Stiles pushes his hips into Derek, every time their cocks slide together, there is a push of energy coming from Stiles. Derek growls and leans into Stiles, pushing his own power into Stiles as they come together. It’s a building wave of need and power and they are soon lost to the push and pull of body and spirit. 

Stiles’s movements become jerky and Derek knows neither of them will last much longer, so he increases his pace and slams his power and body into Stiles. Stiles groans and ribbons of come paint Derek’s stomach and hand a moment before he does the same to Stiles. Derek pulls them together, wrapping his arms around Stiles, headless of the mess as the power pulses and ebbs around them. Derek buries his face in Stiles’s neck and breathes deep, allowing the feeling of peace and home and love to settle into his bones. The smell of StilesandDerek and the land fills him and Derek gives Stiles a playful bite on his neck. Not enough to leave a bruise. Not now. Not yet.

Stiles starts to laugh.

“Well, that’s not exactly the reaction I was looking for,” Derek says dryly.

Stiles shakes his head. “Not you.” Stiles gives him a lingering kiss on the corner of his mouth. “The wards. I think this may have actually made them stronger, us getting handsy and using our power to give each other very impressive orgasms.”

Derek smiles at Stiles. “Perhaps we should make a habit of this.”

Stiles kisses Derek, open mouthed, until they are breathless again. “I’m game, though I have some other ideas that we should try if we can get to a bed.”

Derek picks up his shirt off the ground and starts to clean off both of them. “I know where we can find a perfectly nice bed, plenty of room.”

Stiles swipes up his own shirt, pulls it over his head, and offers his hand to Derek. 

Derek takes it but hesitates. “I don’t know how to do this. I’ve never had a relationship that didn’t end in fire or blood or both.”

Stiles pulls Derek to him and brings Derek’s hand to his lips. “We’ll figure it out together.”

  
  
  



End file.
